Payouts

Big Fish · Post by **Big Fish** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 6:48 am

Hey Guys,

Just a couple of quick questions.

First, if the league expands this year past 300 participants (which it surely looks like it will) will payouts increase for overall champ or 2nd place finish, etc. Based on 300 entries, the payouts currently only total 77.6% (less weekly prizes). It would be great to see this number increase.

Secondly, for the ultimate drafts if the interest is high enough will there be an overall grand prize for finishing in first for this as well?

I am trying to decide for payout purposes where my investment will be best rewarded, ie ultimate draft or championship draft.

I believe if you can make payouts 90% on the Ultimate leagues it would be very attractive to many and draw big interest. To lay out that kind of money, in my humble opinion I believe it will require to pay out more than the 77.6% currently paid out for the NFBC.

Please advise your ideas on payouts as a % of total entries and if they will increase going forward.

Happy holidays to all.

Matt Ross

Fightin' Amish (2004 and 2005 participant NFBC)

Big Fish · Post by **Big Fish** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 7:03 am

The current payout for Ultimate Drafts is 86.4%.

JohnZ · Post by **JohnZ** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 7:43 am

Originally posted by Big Fish:

The current payout for Ultimate Drafts is 86.4%. Both percentages are among the highest in the industry.

Krause does not make a fair return for all their work IMO.

Nevadaman · Post by **Nevadaman** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 7:44 am

Hone your math skills: Ultimate is 83.33%

Big Fish · Post by **Big Fish** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 8:45 am

you are correct 83.3%.

What are your thoughts Nevadaman on payouts?

Big Fish · Post by **Big Fish** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 8:50 am

If NFBC were to conduct only online drafts that would surely increase payouts as a result of reduced draft day costs. Perhaps online drafts are in the future. I know I wouldnt mind drafting from the comforts of home and my desktop.

I signed up anyway for the ultimate draft. Any ideas on how many are already signed up for the Ultimate draft?

Nevadaman · Post by **Nevadaman** » Sat Dec 24, 2005 6:52 am

All signups for all NFBC leagues can be viewed in the thread: 2006 NFBC: Here's the Updated Signup List

There are currently 19 people signed up for the Ultimate Draft.

As for the payout percentage, of course the players would like it to be as high as possible. However, it's probably as high as it's going to get for a live draft. There are lots of expenses involved and Krause has to make something too! I have no problem with the NFBC also running online only leagues that pay a higher percentage, but the live draft is more fun. I have no doubt a lot of people would do both.

CC's Desperados · Post by **CC's Desperados** » Sun Dec 25, 2005 4:09 am

I think if you would like to see the cost for the ultimate to go down. Everyone would have to draft at one site. Right now, Greg will be paying for personal and rooms in at least three sites on Sunday. It would have to be either one site or run at the same time with smaller events(Friday night). In my opinion, I don't think it cost should any more if it was run with another event. I discussed this a little with Greg last year in an E-mail. I have know problem with the cost at this point. He explained that he had cost for three venues. I don't think he planned on having a $5000 league, but the player showed interest. He just delivered the product. I think we all know the pay-outs and this is place to be if you are looking for high stakes baseball.

[ December 25, 2005, 10:10 AM: Message edited by: CC's Desperados ]

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Tue Dec 27, 2005 3:17 am

Originally posted by Big Fish:

If NFBC were to conduct only online drafts that would surely increase payouts as a result of reduced draft day costs. Perhaps online drafts are in the future. I know I wouldnt mind drafting from the comforts of home and my desktop.

I signed up anyway for the ultimate draft. Any ideas on how many are already signed up for the Ultimate draft? You're number 20, Matt. Thanks and we have others who will be signing up for the Ultimate Draft League soon. My hope is to fill two Ultimate Draft Leagues and at least one Ultimate Auction League. Could be a wild time on Sunday, March 19th.

As for questions on payouts for the Ultimate Leagues, yes we do have additional expenses outside of the cash payouts. We are renting space in all four cities for this as we have signed participants in each city and we are keeping at least two KP employees in each city to run these drafts. We'll do these events first-class just like we do everything else and make sure the participants are comfortable when they draft at $5K per team. We also will be licensed by MLBAM in 2006 and obviously pay licensing fees on revenue generated, so not everything goes to KP. It's easy to do the quick math, but trust me not all of the excess money goes directly to the profit side.

We're still building on this fine event and the goal is to have an array of contests that suits everyone's needs. We'll add the satellite leagues before the season, we'll have mid-season leagues again and we'll provide auction leagues in each city. Maybe we'll even have a post-season league this year.

I think most people know me well enough by now to know that this isn't about making as much money as possible. If it was, we wouldn't keep the payouts as high as they are and we wouldn't have taken it in the shorts that first year. We're building on the future and we have some great plans in place to take this to an even higher level. The third year is another stepping stone in that process and we trust it will be a historic one.

Enjoy everyone and let's get it on. Isn't it time for pitchers and catchers to report?

GoldenEagle · Post by **GoldenEagle** » Tue Dec 27, 2005 10:24 am

I would oppose a "Grand Prize" for Ultimate Leagues at this point. I thought that was the whole idea of Ultimate, not watering down the payoffs for the elusive single "PR-prize," (isn't that what the Main Event is for?) but rather Ultimate is to maximize the payout to the winner of each of the leagues of 15. Less luck that way?

IF a $5,000 entry format grows enough to have a 150 entries who don't mind each taking a 33% haircut to chase a single $250,000 Very High Stakes grand prize in future years, then that's one thing. But let's please not "dilute" the "purity" of the Ultimate format, especially not yet.

Greg and KP gets their reasonable 16% cut to cover overhead and profit, but the rest of the money in Ultimate should go "mano a mano" among just the 15 owners! Bring 'em on, and may the best man win!

My 2 cents.

[ December 27, 2005, 04:26 PM: Message edited by: GoldenEagle ]

Chest Rockwell · Post by **Chest Rockwell** » Tue Dec 27, 2005 11:57 am

Greg

Have you all ever thought about dropping the main event to 50k and greatly improve league prizes. The "very" small sample of prospective owners I talk to would probably be more interested.

I know I would like it better.

Just something to throw out there for some opinions..

Bags · Post by **Bags** » Tue Dec 27, 2005 8:32 pm

I've been saying that (reducing overall to 50k in order to beef up other prizes) to Greg since Day 1...

[ December 28, 2005, 02:33 AM: Message edited by: Bags ]

Plymouth · Post by **Plymouth** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 2:38 am

I would be against reducing the "big" prize from $100K. It makes a strong marketing point and reducing it would make this just another fantasy baseball competition. You want to stand out as the best, and you do this by dangling a big carrot. Besides, if you start paying everyone, what is the point? Matter of fact I hope the over all prize goes up as we get more competitors. Look at the Powerball, they dangle that big prize out there and how many people out there buy Powerball tickets when it gets to be a big number? The bigger the $$$ the more people want to play. And, where else do you find 300 to 1 odds on winning $100K.

DOUGHBOYS · Post by **DOUGHBOYS** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 3:01 am

If 50 Grand was taken from the top prize and distributed to league prizes it would only raise each leagues prizes by a little over 2 Grand. Not much more to play for in winning a league.

If your just out to win a league prize every other site on the net is designed to help you. The 100 Grand first prize sets the NFBC apart from the other sites. Here's hoping that in a few years it gets raised to 200 Grand.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 5:43 am

Originally posted by Chest Rockwell:

Greg

Have you all ever thought about dropping the main event to 50k and greatly improve league prizes. The "very" small sample of prospective owners I talk to would probably be more interested.

I know I would like it better.

Just something to throw out there for some opinions.. No, the $100,000 grand prize is a great marketing tool and a great prize to win. My goal is to continue to increase the other overall prizes and slightly increase the league prizes in future years as our entries grow. I definitely could see us increasing the $100,000 if we top 400 teams in 2007, not decreasing it.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 5:44 am

Originally posted by GoldenEagle:

I would oppose a "Grand Prize" for Ultimate Leagues at this point. I thought that was the whole idea of Ultimate, not watering down the payoffs for the elusive single "PR-prize," (isn't that what the Main Event is for?) but rather Ultimate is to maximize the payout to the winner of each of the leagues of 15. Less luck that way?

IF a $5,000 entry format grows enough to have a 150 entries who don't mind each taking a 33% haircut to chase a single $250,000 Very High Stakes grand prize in future years, then that's one thing. But let's please not "dilute" the "purity" of the Ultimate format, especially not yet.

Greg and KP gets their reasonable 16% cut to cover overhead and profit, but the rest of the money in Ultimate should go "mano a mano" among just the 15 owners! Bring 'em on, and may the best man win!

My 2 cents. Yeah, the Ultimate Leagues will remain private payout leagues. That's the beauty of them as everyone feels they can beat 14 other guys for $40,000. It almost looks too easy!

Chest Rockwell · Post by **Chest Rockwell** » Wed Dec 28, 2005 6:00 am

Interesting points, I expected to hear about the marketing aspect of 100k and that is obviously a legit point.

I personally do not play here because of the 100k though. I play because I think it is overall the best competition, the competition acts like adults except for when I talk about a certain Milwaukee pitcher, and I trust Greg and Tom. Those beat any chance at a 100k payday to me.

Bags · Post by **Bags** » Sat Dec 31, 2005 6:50 am

I don't want to pay More People, I want to pay People More. Back before the first season I thought making the OA prize be $100,000 was taking too much from the league prizes. OA has too much luck involved. All Fantasy Sports have luck involved but there's more skill in winning the league. Don't get me wrong, I wish OA was a million bucks! And I totally understand from Greg, and especially KP's, point-of-view that the marketing works better with a 6 figure grand prize. And yes, where else can you get a 1 in 300 chance at 100k. Heck, 1 in 330, 360, even 500 (495 to be exact) is a great opportunity. It's that I'm from the player point-of-view and it would be even better if you could say "Plus all I have to do is finish in the top 3 in my league and I get my money back". That's all I was saying.

Having said all this, now that it has been played for 2 seasons with 100k as the grand prize even I think it would bite if it got reduced. The league prizes are really close to what I felt they should have been anyway. 5k for 1st is perfect (4x the entry). I wanted 2nd to be 2500 (2x) and I think Greg already said it is up to 2250 this year? And then, like I said, 3rd should get your money back.

Basically, IMHO, any new money that comes in from all the additional entries should first go to getting 3rd in the league bumped up and then to 2nd through 8th OA bumped up before going too 200k for 1st OA.

Regardless, it's still the best thing to happen to high-stakes fantasy baseball and I'll be playing every year!

[ December 31, 2005, 12:51 PM: Message edited by: Bags ]